85 Quotes On Integrity

In a world where actions often speak louder than words, integrity emerges as a timeless virtue that guides our decisions and shapes our character. It's the silent compass that directs us towards authenticity, honesty, and honor in every facet of life. Whether in personal relationships, professional endeavors, or self-reflection, integrity remains the cornerstone of trust and respect. This collection of the top 85 quotes on integrity is designed to inspire and elevate your understanding of this profound trait. Through the wisdom of thinkers, leaders, and luminaries, we explore the essence of living with integrity and the profound impact it has on our lives and those around us. Join us on this journey to uncover insights that encourage authentic living and steadfast principles.

1. “Remember, if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember what happened to a boy who was good, and kind, and brave, because he strayed across the path of Lord Voldemort. Remember Cedric Diggory.” - J.K. Rowling

2. “At every moment you choose yourself. But do you choose *your* self? Body and soul contain a thousand possibilities out of which you can build many I's. But in one of them is there a congruence of the elector and the elected. Only one--which you will never find until you have excluded all those superficial and fleeting possibilities of being and doing with which you toy, out of curiosity or wonder or greed, and which hinder you from casting anchor in the experience of the mystery of life, and the consciousness of the talent entrusted to you which is your *I*.” - Dag Hammarskjöld

3. “It is not the repeated mistakes, the long succession of petty betrayals--though, God knows, they would give cause enough for anxiety and self-contempt--but the huge elementary mistake, the betrayal of that within me which is greater than I--in complacent adjustment to alien demands.” - Dag Hammarskjöld

4. “Living with integrity means: Not settling for less than what you know you deserve in your relationships. Asking for what you want and need from others. Speaking your truth, even though it might create conflict or tension. Behaving in ways that are in harmony with your personal values. Making choices based on what you believe, and not what others believe.” - Barbara de Angelis

5. “A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.” - William James

6. “Real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that nobody’s going to know whether you did it or not.” - Oprah Winfrey

7. “But there are times in this harum-scarum world when figuring out the right thing to do is quite simple, but doing the right thing is simply impossible....” - Lemony Snicket

8. “The thought manifests the word;The word manifests the deed;The deed develops into habit;And habit hardens into character;So watch the thought and its ways with care,And let them spring forth from loveBorn out of compassion for all beings.As the shadow follows the body, as we think, so we become.” - Dhammapada

9. “Integrity is telling myself the truth. And honesty is telling the truth to other people.” - Spencer Johnson

10. “When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?” - Eleanor Roosevelt

11. “Our deeds still travel with us from afar/And what we have been makes us what we are.” - George Eliot

12. “Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.” - George Eliot

13. “Be faithful to that which exists within yourself.” - Andre Gide

14. “If you promise the moon, be able to deliver it.” - Byrd Baggett

15. “He caught a glimpse of that extraordinary faculty in man, that strange, altruistic, rare, and obstinate decency which will make writers or scientists maintain their truths at the risk of death. Eppur si muove, Galileo was to say; it moves all the same. They were to be in a position to burn him if he would go on with it, with his preposterous nonsense about the earth moving round the sun, but he was to continue with the sublime assertion because there was something which he valued more than himself. The Truth. To recognize and to acknowledge What Is. That was the thing which man could do, which his English could do, his beloved, his sleeping, his now defenceless English. They might be stupid, ferocious, unpolitical, almost hopeless. But here and there, oh so seldome, oh so rare, oh so glorious, there were those all the same who would face the rack, the executioner, and even utter extinction, in the cause of something greater than themselves. Truth, that strange thing, the jest of Pilate's. Many stupid young men had thought they were dying for it, and many would continue to die for it, perhaps for a thousand years. They did not have to be right about their truth, as Galileo was to be. It was enough that they, the few and martyred, should establish a greatness, a thing above the sum of all they ignorantly had.” - T.H. White

16. “We should not allow our personal values to erode, even if others think we are peculiar.” - James E. Faust

17. “Integrity is not a conditional word. It doesn't blow in the wind or change with the weather. It is your inner image of yourself, and if you look in there and see a man who won't cheat, then you know he never will. Integrity is not a search for the rewards of integrity. Maybe all you ever get for it is the largest kick in the ass the world can provide. It is not supposed to be a productive asset.” - John D. MacDonald

18. “Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.” - Samuel Johnson

19. “Integrity has no need of rules.” - Albert Camus

20. “Anyone who says he knows God's intention is showing a lot of very human ego.” - Michael Crichton

21. “There can be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity.” - Samuel Johnson

22. “Justification for infidelity and dishonesty in all their manifestations lies in the marginal cost economics of “just this once.” - Clayton M. Christensen

23. “There is no such thing as a minor lapse of integrity” - Tom Peters

24. “Honesty is more than not lying. It is truth telling, truth speaking, truth living, and truth loving.” - James E. Faust

25. “I've heard it said of faith that first we jump, and then we grow wings. Integrity is like that too, I think. That's what you have to gain. The sacrifice turns into a gift that is priceless.” - Matt Baldwin

26. “If you do politics the right way, I believe, you can actually make people's lives better. And integrity is the minimum ante to get into the game.” - Joe Biden

27. “Let it be considered that what is more wholesome than any particular belief is integrity of belief; and that to avoid looking into the support of any belief from a fear that it may turn out rotten is quite as immoral as it is disadvantageous.” - Charles Sanders Peirce

28. “The person of superior integrity does not insist upon his integrity.For this reason, he has integrity.The person of inferior integritynever loses sight of his integrity;For this reason, he lacks integrity.” - Lao Tzu

29. “Confidence in others' honesty is no light testimony of one's own integrity.” - Michel de Montaigne

30. “I will not deny but that the best apology against false accusers is silence and sufferance, and honest deeds set against dishonest words.” - John Milton

31. “Truth at last cannot be hidden. Dissimulation is of no avail. Dissimulation is to no purpose before so great a judge. Falsehood puts on a mask. Nothing is hidden under the sun.” - Leonardo da Vinci

32. “How much time he gains who does not look to see what his neighbour says or does or thinks, but only at what he does himself, to make it just and holy.” - Marcus Aurelius

33. “A quiet conscience makes one strong!” - Anne Frank

34. “The armour of falsehood is subtly wrought out of darkness, and hides a man not only from others, but from his own soul.” - E.M. Forster

35. “I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.” - Charlotte Brontë

36. “In the end you should always do the right thing even if it's hard.” - Nicholas Sparks

37. “Rise early and seize each day, learn much and use this knowledge well, spend time with those you love, never abuse your pets, use logic to fight the irrational (for it is everywhere), defend the environment and its wildlife as a knight would protect King Arthur, meld mind and heart for greatest creativity, follow your dreams, and become all that you can be.” - Charles Kohlhase

38. “I know that what you call 'God' really exists, but not in the form you think; God is primal cosmic energy, the love in your body, your integrity, and your perception of the nature in you and outside of you.” - Wilhelm Reich

39. “Whatever does not pretend at all has style enough.” - Booth Tarkington

40. “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.” - Abraham Lincoln

41. “Wherever you find a great man, you will find a great mother or a great wife standing behind him -- or so they used to say. It would be interesting to know how many great women have had great fathers and husbands behind them.” - Dorothy L. Sayers

42. “You'd think (losing his job and degree for having made false claims as a researcher) would be a lesson to him," said Miss Hillyard. "It didn't pay, did it? Say he sacrificed his professional honour for the women and children we hear so much about -- but in the end it left him worse of."But that," said Peter, "was only because he committed the extra sin of being found out.” - Dorothy L. Sayers

43. “Good men don't become legends," he said quietly."Good men don't need to become legends." She opened her eyes, looking up at him. "They just do what's right anyway.” - Brandon Sanderson

44. “...Regardless, I still do not believe that your duty is to do as the people wish. Your duty is to lead as best you can, following the dictates of your conscience. You must be true. Your Majesty, to the man you wish to become....” - Brandon Sanderson

45. “Dogs have more love than integrity. They've been true to us, yes, but they haven't been true to themselves.” - Clarence Day

46. “Before speaking, consult your inner-truth barometer, and resist the temptation to tell people only what they want to hear.” - Wayne W. Dyer

47. “Lead your life so you wouldn't be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip. ” - Will Rogers

48. “Courage becomes a worthwhile and meaningful virtue when it is regarded not so much as a willingness to die manfully but as a determination to live decently.” - Thomas S. Monson

49. “Be happy, noble heart, be blessed for all the good thou hast done and wilt do hereafter, and let my gratitude remain in obscurity like your good deeds.” - Alexandre Dumas

50. “However much we obfuscate or ignore it, we know that the factory farm is inhumane in the deepest sense of the word. And we know that there is something that matters in a deep way about the lives we create for the living beings most within our power. Our response to the factory farm is ultimately a test of how we respond to the powerless, to the most distant, to the voiceless--it is a test of how we act when no one is forcing us to act one way or another.” - Jonathan Safran Foer

51. “Allow yourself to think only those thoughts that match your principles and can bear the bright light of day. Day by day, your choices, your thoughts, your actions fashion the person you become. Your integrity determines your destiny.” - Heraclitus

52. “As you change your point of view, your views bring about a change in you.” - George Alexiou

53. “Honor is no phantom. Duty doesn't melt away, no matter how much we might wish it to.” - Claudia J. Edwards

54. “Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama.” - Miguel Ruiz

55. “The one thing which seems to me quite impossible is to take into consideration the kind of book one is expected to write; surely one can only write the book that is there to be written.(Letter to Muriel St. Clare Byrne, 8 September 1935)” - Dorothy L. Sayers

56. “They all have excellent resumes... So what I’m trying to find out is how they will behave under pressure.” - Hyman G. Rickover

57. “No: I shall not marry Samuel Fawthrop Wynne.""I ask why? I must have a reason. In all respects he is more than worthy of you."She stood on the hearth; she was pale as the white marble slab and cornice behind her; her eyes flashed large, dilated, unsmiling."And I ask in what sense that young man is worthy of me?” - Charlotte Brontë

58. “I am anchored on a resolve you cannot shake. My heart, my conscience shall dispose of my hand -- they only. Know this at last.” - Charlotte Brontë

59. “[I]t is not by being richer or more powerful that a man becomes better; one is a matter of fortune, the other of virtue. Nor should she deem herself other than venal who weds a rich man rather than a poor, and desires more things in her husband than himself. Assuredly, whomsoever this concupiscence leads into marriage deserves payment rather than affection.” - Héloïse

60. “[A]s though mindful of the wife of Lot, who looked back from behind him, thou deliveredst me first to the sacred garments and monastic profession before thou gavest thyself to God. And for that in this one thing thou shouldst have had little trust in me I vehemently grieved and was ashamed. For I (God [knows]) would without hesitation precede or follow thee to the Vulcanian fires according to thy word. For not with me was my heart, but with thee. But now, more than ever, if it be not with thee, it is nowhere. For without thee it cannot anywhere exist.” - Héloïse

61. “A few people of integrity can go a long way.” - Bill Kauth

62. “Too much honesty makes you sound insincere.” - Patrick Rothfuss

63. “Healthy children will not fear life if their elders have integrity enough not to fear death.” - Erik H. Erikson

64. “Politics is the art of saying well that which may or may not be true.” - Orrin Woodward

65. “A wise woman knows when to stay silent. However, a wiser woman of faith knows that sometimes words can win the battle, when all odds stand against her.” - Shannon L. Alder

66. “Your integrity is sacrosanct. It is who you are. Never let anyone step on your integrity - that's absolutely where you must stand solid.” - Ret. Gen. Peter Pace

67. “Speak your truth with grace and integrity, even though it might upset some people. You never know who else, besides yourself, it might help.” - Leila Summers

68. “After character becomes imbued with conscious principles of love, integrity, and faith, it opens the door for purity and holiness to converge at the portals of the soul like sentinels guarding against any counter attacks from the ego.” - Gary Gordon

69. “Integrity is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake your consciousness, just as honesty is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake existence.” - Ayn Rand

70. “Every coach, every executive, every leader: They all know right from wrong. Even those Enron guys. When someone uncovers a scandal in their company, I don't think they can say, "I didn't know that was going on." They're just saying they're too dumb to do their job! And if they really are too dumb, then why are they getting paid millions of dollars to do it? They know what's going on.” - Bo Schembechler

71. “Everyone makes mistakes, but only a person with integrity owns up to them.” - Nicole Guillaume

72. “Leaders always choose the harder right rather than the easier wrong.” - Orrin Woodward

73. “So remember those who win the gameLose the love they sought to gainIn debitures of quality and dubious integrityTheir small-town eyes will gape at youIn dull surprise when payment dueExceeds accounts received at seventeen” - janis ian

74. “We continuously enhance our knowledge base be it latest in technology, market scenario or customer requirements.” - UAE Exchange

75. “I quit eating meat in 1976, the same year I turned fifteen, came out, and went to my first gay rights rally (not in that order). When I say that I 'came out,' I mean that I resolved to never lie about my love for women, never deliberately pass for straight, and never deny a lover by calling her 'him.' To do so, I felt, would be to betray not only the women I desired, but my deepest self.My decision to quit meat was equally simple. Somehow, through the confluence of midseventies influences, I knew that vegetarianism was a particularly healthy way to eat. One day, quite suddenly, I realized: If I didn't need to eat meat to stay alive, then eating meat was killing for pleasure. I couldn't live with myself, wouldn't be the nonviolent person I believed myself to be, if I killed other beings--beings who had their own desires--merely to satisfy my desire for the taste of their flesh.Looking back, I see that both decisions, coming out and quitting meat, are about the interplay of desire and integrity. Sometimes integrity means being true to your desires, and sometimes integrity requires you to refuse your desires. I also notice that both decisions were about bodies and consent. A primary tenet of gay liberation is that what consenting people do with each other's bodies is nobody else's business. And, of course, eating meat is something you do to somebody else's body without their consent.” - pattrice jones

76. “The world does not need more Christian literature. What it needs is more Christians writing good literature.” - C.S. Lewis

77. “Truth and integrity must be so rare these days that it confuses people when they hear it.” - Donna Lynn Hope

78. “Staying silent is like a slow growing cancer to the soul and a trait of a true coward. There is nothing intelligent about not standing up for yourself. You may not win every battle. However, everyone will at least know what you stood for—YOU.” - Shannon L. Alder

79. “The relationship you take for granted is the one that needs the greatest work.” - George Alexiou

80. “Kindness is a currency that can cover a multitude of interpersonal debts.” - George Alexiou

81. “Success follows those who champion a cause greater than themselves.” - George Alexiou

82. “Happiness has no time limits or conditions; the only requirement is to give it away.” - George Alexiou

83. “Choosing with integrity means finding ways to speak up that honor your reality, the reality of others, and your willingness to meet in the center of that large field. It’s hard sometimes.” - Terry Tempest Williams

84. “Art gives its vision to beauty not always recognized. And it surrenders freely -- whatever power it possesses to every sincere soul that seeks it. But above all else--it presents us with the gift of ourselves.” - Aberjhani

85. “Love – Acceptance – Unity – Peace –Integrity – Respect… a strong, pure creed is short on words and long on nourishing ideas. For me, the longer the creed the more it has been diluted, manipulated, and spoiled. The results of this creed poisoning can be seen in the behavior of its followers. We have all heard the expression, “The devil is in the details”; my observations have led me to suspect this is true.” - Steve Maraboli